The base closings commission has sent its recommendations for closing or realigning Defense Department facilities to President Bush, who has indicated that he will accept the recommendations as a whole and forward them to Congress. The actions would be carried out over a period of about six years and would directly or indirectly affect the lives of tens of thousands of DoD employees—including potentially thousands of layoffs and the abolition of many more jobs through attrition, early retirement and buyout incentives, and other tools, plus transfers and other types of spill-over personnel actions. The list will be effective unless Congress acts to stop it. That isn’t expected, although an attempt might be made, possibly by an amendment to the annual Defense Department authorization measure, which is still pending a vote in the Senate. Several suits already have been filed to stop the actions, and more are possible. A federal judge has sided with the plaintiffs in one such case, blocking at least temporarily the realignment of the 103d Fighter Wing at Bradley Air National Guard Station in Connecticut.